- Description of the point. Possibly opinion of original poster. (original poster, confirming/strengthening poster) - Number of times this point has been confirmed/strengthened [comment by me - possibly a cry for YOUR help to confirm the issue]

- Mute point, either fixed or otherwise pointless. Still here to be remembered. Only found under category 17. Old points (original poster) [comment by me]

Feel free to search through this post for the themes included in this \tableofcontents:

- I see the hero you get at 800 fame is still level 1. I thought that had been fixed, but I guess not. Seems like it shouldn't reset to 1. (Publius of NV) [unconfirmed. GandalfTheRedskin reported otherwise]

1. (Possible) Exploits:

- Pioneer exploit: queue up a bunch of pioneers to cheat the growth system (Brainjuggler, Mistwraithe)

- Pioners and any other units who cost resources should consume resource on completion and skip turns if resource not available, not consuming at moment of queue, this will fix all possible issues with grown, interest and everything else. (sharpxe)

- City militia units will only fight once: attack with one sacrificial unit, then attack with a second stack and all the city defenders won't be there (Brainjuggler)

2. Military / Combat System:

- City Militia would like ALOT of love. They require armour. (See parrotmath's armor mod to get you started). YOUR city militia also disappear after the first combat in a turn BUT AI city militia is full health every combat within a turn. Major imbalance and unfairness. Both AI and player should be under SAME rules. City militia should have health and death tracked throughout the turn so that multiple attacks can be defended by the same city militia AND those city milita retain damage dealt and deaths throughout the turn. (GFireflyE, Brainjuggler, abob101)

- Maybe give the militia the "defensive" trait and a shield (at least a wooden shield, or maybe the best shield currently available). That would make them more useful without making them too powerful. (Azunai_)

- Magical mercenaries should be changed to include mana upkeep. More types of mercenaries would be fun (even if it's DRM) (GFireflyE)

- The cooldown of player and monster abilities should be reduced to 3 turns to make the combat more interesting. (Wizard1200)

- Caster heroes, even those with "melee" weapons equipped like the starting caster staff should be treated as ranged units for troop placement at the start of a battle. Caster heroes are still starting in the front lines with the melee troops if they have a staff/dagger. (Kantok)

- It's too easy to do absurd stuff in combat. Summon Skeletal Horde+Cull the Weak and Gallowman's consume spirit can generate far too much mana, Life Draining abilities and free heals makes the fastest way to recover health, to find a random weak AI city or wandering monster as a full heal. I propose that abilities that produce mana in combat should be capped at the amount of mana you started the battle with. Same for health production abilities. (Arcayer, sxyz123)

- Combats using Auto-Completion are handy, excepting that the AI often manages to deal out disproportionate damage to the Player's units making this method lackluster. (BernieTime)

- Conquering an enemy faction. When forcing the Enemy AI to surrender it's counter productive to raze the former leader's cities. If nothing else, the surrendering AI cities should become independent, not just disappear like Atlantis =P If that faction is/was my Ally, there should be a method of making the former Sovereign into a Vassal at some point. Maybe if my Ally's population or cities are below a certain threshold. (BernieTime)

- Magical staves always do the same damage even vs. magic immune targets. (Chaosti) [Please tell me how they work against Frost/Fire resistance]

- rename the "pass" button in tactical combat to "defend", and maybe add a tooltip that shows how much defense you gain from defending instead of attacking. (Azunai_)

3. Unit Abilities (granted from weapons or races):

- Bows and staves have no special abilities. Bows could have the "rain of arrows" or any other interesting ability and staves could have the "focus" ability that works like the spell with an additional action immediately afterwards. (Wizard1200, GFireflyE)

- I would offer that 'rain of arrows' be limited in range (assuming that you mean for the ability to do splash damage to a 2x2 tile area) so that bowmen cannot abuse it from afar. (GFireflyE)

- Staves would be cooler with some kind of ability like 'surge' or 'Spell Focus' that increases the potency of your next spell by 25%. (ie, casting Blind with surge would generate a 31% blindness instead of the regular 25%) (GFireflyE) [or maybe increase the buff duration?]

- Lucky is too strong and could instead better work like backswing. (Wizard1200)

- The Faction points that uncover research would be cooler if they would add some other unique bonus (e.g. Civilized would unlock "Civics" and provide a +5% gildar bonus) (me)

- Racial perks are balanced in favor of the Fallen Empires. Especially Tarth gives the Kingdoms a disadvantage compared to Urxens. (ArisianOne)

5. Heroes Abilities/ Skill Paths / general:

- Warrior trait tree: Probably switch the special abilities that currently hide behind Weapon specific (e.g. +Axe Damage/+Spear Damage) traits to the front of those lines. That would in my humble opinion make the warrior so much more onjoyable to level instead of being stuck with boring +dmg that does not even benefit your current weapon. (me)

- the path trees are too long and the abilities have too many prerequisites. For example instead of evoker I - IV there should be only aeromancy, geomancy, ... that increases the damage of air, earth, ... spells by 50 % or instead of vital strike I - III there should be only vital strike that increases the critical hit chance by 15 and the critical damage by 50 %. (Wizard1200, Lord Micheal) [this has been partly changed during recent versions - Evoker IV was removed]

- Totally agree here. After playing a few games in beta, I think when a champion levels up, they should be able to choose one trait

in each tree. I find myself choosing only spells in the beginning. By the time I start choosing combat skills the game is nearly over. (Lord Micheal, Bernietime)

- Hero Trait advancement is painfully slow. Recommend giving "free" extra traits every "x" levels and a Free Trait pick upon choosing the Hero's path. Free trait picks could be restricted to the Generic side only used to help balance out some current path deficiencies. Like having an Armor advancement path restricted by Level. (Bernietime) [e.g. something along the lines of a 2 traits points every 5 levels]

- Why not give a customisable hero/hench once the game has gone through all the pre-programmed heroes? So you could choose the skills, Path and items (within certain constraints) for an x level hero/hench. As a reward for getting to a high level of fame (you attract the heroes you want ). (StevenAus) [fyi the last hero currently unlocks at 4800 Fame]

- As soon as a medium or high level commander is in an army the unit stats are unbalanced. The commander could instead of passives use active abilites e.g. to improve the accuracy by 25 for 1 turn, the spell resistance by 25 for 1 turn, ... (Wizard1200)

- If commanders are too strong, then their abilities should be weakened, but making them be like other heroes just so that they line up better is wrong. The entire point of a commander is to fill the role of a vanilla hero who doesn't have to go about doing stuff to function. We already have an active buffer, he's the defender. (Arcayer)

- The Commander Champions should be able to gain XP 's while assisting cities too. (Lord Micheal)

- How about for Commander exp there is exp bonus for building world achievements where they are stationed? Maybe even other 1 per faction buildings but not as much awarded? (kendainty)

- Beastmasters can tame extremely powerful beasts, en-masse early in, which then have no upkeep. Tame beast's cost should scale to the level of the enemy monster, making it easier to tame wandering wolves in the beginning, and harder to start out with an armada of cave bears. (Arcayer)

6. Heroes' Spells:

- The scaling of some spells destroys the balance. For example flame dart is useless at low levels and overpowered at high levels. (Wizard1200)

- The power of some spells is too low (shadowbolt, cloak of thorns, ...) and should be increased like the healing spells in 0.87 (Wizard1200) [Shadowbolt was nerfed due to the Spell not being resistable]

- The AI does not use strategic spells (pillar of flame, freeze, ...) against the player and strategic spells inflict too much damage IF a high level mage casts them. (Wizard1200) [The AI does use some spells now. Although that number and variety could still be improved upon imho]

7. (Heroes') Items:

- Staves should use spell mastery for the attack and spell resistance for the defense. (Wizard1200, GFireflyE)

- All 'magical' staves should be ranged weapons that deal magical damage equal to their specific shard type (blunt weapons staves that have no magical properties can remain melee, though I doubt any hero would use them). This would place mages on the backline WHERE THEY BELONG. Mage path should have the ability to increase the damage of their staff weapon embeded within. Something like "Attunement - increase staff attack by 25% if you share magic type as the staff) (GFireflyE) [This also concerns the Summoners Staff with the +10 atk vs. elementals, it is pretty useless atm]

- Complex does not equal interesting. Vanilla pieces are as important as their more complicated counterparts. (Arcayer) [agreed, but it shouldn't mean that there should be no Staves/Bows with special abilities]

- The damage of crossbows is too low. (Wizard1200) [and they are still not to different from bows. boring.]

- Few Late game Mage/Archer items and much less Mage items compared to melee. (Stupidity10)

8. Outposts:

- Outposts may be better off if a different unit would be used for construction. At the moment, it costs WAY too much for pioneers to be used to construct outposts. The SCOUT unit should have the option to be consumed and build an outpost. Imo, upgrading outposts should involve scouts being consumed on the site to select an upgrade INSTEAD of the current option of building upgrades directly from your city. Outposts should also have the CHOICE of which city they are to be associated with and thereby where the bonuses they are collecting are going to. Resources should be tied to the closest outpost/city. (Not just the closest city). (GFireflyE, Brainjuggler)

9. Economy/Cities:

- The tax system could better have different internals: Free Spirited at 10% tax with 16% unrest, Low at 20% tax with 19% unrest, Normal at 30% tax with 24% unrest. High at 50% tax wtih 40% unrest, Brutal at 70% tax with 64% unrest, and finally Oppressive at 90% tax with 96% unrest. Some other economy and unrest rebalancing may have to be done as well, but this opens up taxing your population with MUCH more meaningful levels of tax. (GFireflyE) [some work has been done here. I would like more opinions on this matter. How does the new tax system fare?]

- unique buildings: adding a unique building to the queue prevents anyone else from building it (even if its not built yet) (Brainjuggler)

- All factions should be able to attempt building the Unique Wonders. The Faction that finishes first should get full benefits, but that shouldn't negate other nations from completing a "knockoff" of the wonder. You'd still get a building and not wasting all that queue time, it just wouldn't be anywhere near as impressive as the "Original Wonder". (BernieTime)

- City Razing is imbalanced. Should imo NOT be instant razing. A raze could better take duration equal to city level. (GFireflyE, sharpxe, abob101)

- City Razing is one of the biggest flubs that FE/LH has in place. The best method IMO that has been suggested is that a city which has been successfully attacked suffers a major population loss. If population goes below Zero, THEN the city is reduced to rubble. Oh, and quit salting the square where the city used to be. That's just stupid. Ireland is full of Castles being build on top of other Castles. (BernieTime)

- While it's currently not the actual case in the game, you shouldn't be receiving a global unrest penalty for having a recently conquered city to your empire. That unrest should be localized to the conquered city in question. As the local unrest of the conquered city decreases over time, the global unrest should increase. (GFireflyE)

- Cities should level up at different intervals: Level2 @ 100 pop. Level3 @ 200 pop. Level4 @ 400pop. Level5 @ 600pop. Right now, you're capital levels WAY too fast, often before your second city location is even discovered and the player has to make an UNINFORMED decision as to what your capital now has to specialize into. (GFireflyE)

- Road pathbuilding wants to have attention. Many threads about this one. (GFireflyE)

10. Quests / Random Events / Experience:

- More quests should give options to choose between different artifacts. (Stupidity10)

- Combats with AI should generate similarly weighted experiance as combats with monsters. Currently there is almost ZERO point to attacking AI to generate experiance. In addition, random events should be gone through to ensure that proper amounts of fame and experiance are handed out upon there completion. (I've seen too many that were overlooked). (GFireflyE) [apparently trash units give trash exp and late game units give more exp.]

11. AI:

- While the AI has improved dramatically to date, there is still a huge lack when it comes to their strategic military decisions. When to declare war. When to demand tribute. When to attack weaker stacks. When to attack stronger ones. Why don't they do stuff like summon units when in combat? Or cast strategic spells just prior to an attack? Or clear there own territory of quest huts and lair huts? Or buy 50 copies of the same leather bracers (saw that again in a 0.80 let's play)? Or always do the same strategy to victory (resoln is ALWAYS building towers)? Imo, there should be a different level of interaction between AI 'out there' and AI touching your faction's borders. (GFireflyE)

- Diplomacy is still an aspect of the game that is lacking. There are not enough options to interact with the AI. Different types of treaties. Different types of pacts and alliances. AI should have different levels of tolerance in dealing with you depending on who you are, who they are, special considerations, and faction power. Lot's of work to be done here imo. (GFireflyE, abob101)

- AI is terrible at building infrastructure. Villages, Conclaves and Towns all build troops even when fortresses are available. Ive seen newly founded villages produce troops then build buildings that increase food or gildar by %. (Stupidity10)

- I would really love for AI to value resources EVEN if they have some of those. It makes no sense to attempt a trade with an AI player who got 20 metal, and I'm offering him 50 and the perceived value is 0. Really? Same with crystals, horses and wargs. As it is now you can't do anything with your surplus of a resource except money - Gildar, and research knowledge. It makes no sense at all. If I'm stranded in a location and only resource available to me are horses or metal, I should be able to trade it for crystals or wargs. Yes if the AI has some too, maybe even more than he needs, he will give me a low price for it, but really 100 crystals value 0 to you when you have only 15? (Anelyn)

- My biggest AI pet peeves are about the fact that it still does things players just wouldn't do, ever. 1) It sends out lone heroes into enemy territory. It just shouldn't do that. Only in peaceful times when you're levelling your hero he might be on his own. Otherwise always accompanied by troops. 2) It makes too many 'unit only stacks' and hardly no stacks of doom. Players only make a few stacks and try to make them as strong as possible. The AI should really invest more time in that and not scatter its units so much. (LordTheRon)

12. Map Issues:

- Unrest should be made to scale with the Map size. Currently on Huge Maps Unrest is really unmanageable. The way the game works now I've never been able to scale the economy above LOW due to lack of ways to counter Unrest as an Empire grows. (BernieTime)

13. Victory Conditions:

- Also at victory conditions, change Diplomatic Victory to: Create and hold an Alliance with all players left in game for 30 seasons (or something like this). Is really too easy to get this victory as it is now, pretty much if you have a slight start / faction power compared to rest of AI's, is the quickest way to win the game without even breaking past mid game tech / research wise. (Anelyn)

14. UI:

- Please add a scaling to the skillbars in tactical combat to support the usage of the whole widescreen monitor some technologically advanced people here use. Kidding. At this moment in time everyones skillsbar is as long as 1/10th of the whole screen even on a 640*480 resolution... That really is a waste. Just take a look at Dragon Age:Origins - their skillbar was customizable in length. The first 10 skills had shortcuts (the numbers 1-0) and after that the other skills were just clickable. Imho a good way to handle that. (me, cammagno74)

- Clarify the way traits stack. at the moment, it's not obvious whether traits stack or replace each other (they all stack, btw.). that's a fairly common question in the forum (a new version of that thread pops up about once per week). I suggest changing the descriptions/tooltips of the traits to better describe the mechanic, for example: "Lethal III - increases Attack by +5, cumulative with Lethal I and Lethal II for a combined effect of +12". Alternately, change the descriptions/tooltips to indicate the combined value and change the description accordingly, i.E. "Lethal III - increases attack by +12, replaces Lethal I and II". I think the second version is easier to understand, though the first one is probably easier to implement (just have to change the tooltip/description texts, without changing program logic which icons to display on the character sheet) (Azunai_)

- the swapping of queue items is too unintuitive: add 2 buttons that appear when you select an item in the queue : 1st button = move the item 1 position up in the queue, 2nd button = move 1 position down in the queue. OR Make the "queue list" be completly scrollable with the mouse, so that, when you have selected one item with the mouse, if you move the mouse on the left part of the page, the game understand that you want to move this item on the previous page, and scroll to this page automaticaly. (stardock334)

- Upgrade paths for items are still messed up. I think the simpliest solution would be: offer 2 upgrade 'paths'. one for the 'warfare' path and one for the 'magic' path items. That way, for example, if I want warhammers on my units rather than lightning hammers, I can. Same thing with regards to armor and such. (Chaosti) [this has changed during the last few version. Please provide a bit more feedback for it.]

- When upgrading units: if doing an armour upgrade, the game should not try to replace soldier's boots (+1 initiative) with armor-type boots (e.g. leather)! Similarly, it really shouldn't try to upgrade leather armor into the monk's armor (sure it gives 1 extra defense and 5 dodge, but generally that's not a worthwhile upgrade for the crystal and gold cost!) (Chaosti)

15. Crashes/Graphical Errors:

- Restarting a game too often will cause the graphic engine to break and deliver graphics too bright to be pleasing. (me)

- After playing for too long the game will start flickering and eventually black will cover most of the screen. The game itself still works if you know where to click. But you can no longer see any menues, etc. (me)

- The game will sometimes not close its process after a long playsession causing possibly 1GB of Memory and a great deal of Processor power to be blocked (probably due to a memory leak). (me)

16. General Game Development:

- Be inspired by Mods produced from the Community. I really couldn't stand playing without the Bridge Mod (for instance). (BernieTime)

- Also, I totally agree that playstyle is very important; that's why I'm suggesting buffing the less interesting factions, rather than nerfing the powerful ones (I don't want to see balance come at the expense of diversity). Really, the whole point is that I'd love to see even more playstyles be viable without feeling like I'm unduly handicapping myself. (ArisianOne)

17. Old points (uncategorized):

- And finally archery bug. If my Assassin uses bows, and I researched end of the line longbows (including magical ones) who supposedly ignore 50% of target defense, that coupled with my 75% target defense ignore from Assassin path, should give me 100% Defense ignore on enemies. Yet the damage displayed on tooltip and actual damage dealt in combat reflects that neither are applied at all. With a Sovereign with 24 attack, with a bow that deals fire damage and amulets that add fire and ice damage (2 each), with 75% + 50% Defense ignore, with Break used, should do more than 1-5 damage on a Statue Lord (or what he's called, the ones leading the golem bands in scrapyard). (Anelyn) [Probably fixed during the fixing of curse. That fix also made "Ereogs Token" a very good item. Try it!]

- Break skill does not work. It graphically applies the debuff on targeted enemy, it is shown when inspecting said enemy in tactical screen, but it's effect is not applied, target retains full defense (against all attackers, including the Assassin who used Break). (Anelyn) [Supposedly fixed as of 0.9 - someone confirm this please]

- Heroes that have no more traits to spend skill points on get stuck in the levelup screen once they level up again. (me) [fixed as of 0.87]

- Knights of Asok, Mercenary and Border Camps are still useless due to the high upkeep cost of their units and the inability to upgrade them. This will ruin one to many games a new player will start (this was pointed out by Lord Xia in the 0.87 and 0.9 Changelog post) [balanced during 0.91]

- Stacks can't move after fighting: let an enemy clear a nest of baddies, then claim the treasure yourself. With some clever use of sacrificial units and choke points, you can keep enemy stacks at bay indefinitely. (Brainjuggler) [Changed during 0.91 or 0.92]

- unique buildings must be reworked in favor of MP balance - first player who build recieve fullpower structure, all other players still able to build it, but recieve only minor bonus. (sharpxe) [Stardock said that the game will not be balanced towards MP if there will ever be one.]

- BTW: The hard cap of 9 on resources per square of land (ie grain + materials + essence <= 9) is my personal bugbear, I detest this change. Not sure if others agree but merely knowing that I have no chance of finding a really awesome settle spot removes a significant part of my fun from exploring and expanding. I haven't tried the latest couple of versions tho so it is possible they have already removed the hard cap. (Mistwraithe) [the cap is moddable through the xml]

- Also another execution glitch with Rain of Arrows from Assassin path, sometimes (often) instead of firing instantly the caster remains stuck for 10-15 seconds with no casting animation then the damage happens instantly. (Anelyn) [this has been fixed as of 0.91]

city militia units will only fight once: attack with one sacrificial unit, then attack with a second stack and all the city defenders won't be there

stacks can't move after fighting: let an enemy clear a nest of baddies, then claim the treasure yourself. With some clever use of sacrificial units and choke points, you can keep enemy stacks at bay indefinitely.

pioneer exploit: queue up a bunch of pioneers to cheat the growth system

unique buildings: adding a unique building to the queue prevents anyone else from building it (even if its not built yet)

2) City razing in single turn (really wtf? what idiot designed it?) especially by single wolf.

3) Fight ends movement is ok for stacks without hero, but hero stack shoud continue fighting, current champion system can manage this.

4) Pioners and any other units who cost resources shoud consume resource on completion and skip turns if resource not available, not consuming at moment of queue, this will fix all possible issues with grown, interest and everything else.

5) unique buildings must be reworked in favor of MP balance - first player who build recieve fullpower structure, all other players still able to build it, but recieve only minor bonus.

Difficult to say what is critical and what is wishful, but here is my list of "to-do":

City Militia need ALOT of love. They require armour. (See parrotmath's armor mod to get you started). YOUR city militia also disappear after the first combat in a turn BUT AI city militia is full health every combat within a turn. Major imbalance and unfairness. Both AI and player should be under SAME rules. City militia should have health and death tracked throughout the turn so that multiple attacks can be defended by the same city militia AND those city milita retain damages and deaths throughout the turn.

City Razing is imbalanced. Should NOT be instant razing. A raze should take duration equal to city level.

Mercenaries NEED rebalancing when it comes to gildar upkeep. Magical mercs also need rebalance to include mana upkeep. More types of mercenary are required (even if it's DRM)

Road pathbuilding needs to have attention. Many threads about this one.

Outposts require a different unit for construction. At the moment, it costs WAY too much for pioneers to be used to construct outposts. The SCOUT unit should have the option to be consumed and build an outpost. Imo, upgrading outposts should involve scouts being consumed on the site to select an upgrade INSTEAD of the current option of building upgrades directly from your city. Outposts should also have the CHOICE of which city they are to be associated with and thereby where the bonuses they are collecting are going to. Resources should be tied to the closest outpost/city. (Not just the closest city).

Combat ending the stack's turn should be REMOVED. Instead, new rule should be implemented 'each unit can only be part of one combat'. You should be allowed to MOVE after combat.

Cities should level up at different intervals: Level2 @ 100 pop. Level3 @ 200 pop. Level4 @ 400pop. Level5 @ 600pop. Right now, you're capital levels WAY too fast, often before your second city location is even discovered and the player has to make an UNINFORMED decision as to what your capital now has to specialize into.

The tax system needs to have different internals: Free Spirited at 10% tax with 16% unrest, Low at 20% tax with 19% unrest, Normal at 30% tax with 24% unrest. High at 50% tax wtih 40% unrest, Brutal at 70% tax with 64% unrest, and finally Oppressive at 90% tax with 96% unrest. Some other economy and unrest rebalancing may have to be done as well, but this opens up taxing your population with MUCH more meaningful levels of tax.

Combats with AI should generate similarly weighted experiance as combats with monsters. Currently there is almost ZERO point to attacking AI to generate experiance. In addition, random events should be gone through to ensure that proper amounts of fame and experiance are handed out upon there completion. (I've seen too many that were overlooked).

While the AI has improved dramatically to date, there is still a huge lack when it comes to their strategic military decisions. When to declare war. When to demand tribute. When to attack weaker stacks. When to attack stronger ones. Why don't they do stuff like summon units when in combat? Or cast strategic spells just prior to an attack? Or clear there own territory of quest huts and lair huts? Or buy 50 copies of the same leather bracers (saw that again in a 0.80 let's play)? Or always do the same strategy to victory (resolin is ALWAYS building towers)? Imo, there should be a different level of interaction between AI 'out there' and AI touching your faction's borders.

Diplomacy is still an aspect of the game that is lacking. There are not enough options to interact with the AI. Different types of treaties. Different types of pacts and alliances. AI should have different levels of tolerance in dealing with you depending on who you are, who they are, special considerations, and faction power. Lot's of work to be done here imo.

Swarm Mechanic TOO powerful. REMOVE the +1 atk from the bonus. Flanking units should NOT be granting additional attack. Addition accuracy is very keen and balanced. The +1 atk makes attrition too powerful a strategy.

Don't want to sound negative with all these comments...but did want to follow the request of the OP in outlining what I thought still needed to be addressed for FE...I mean LH.

The path trees are too long and the abilities have too many prerequisites. For example instead of evoker I - IV there should be only aeromancy, geomancy, ... that increases the damage of air, earth, ... spells by 50 % or instead of vital strike I - III there should be only vital strike that increases the critiacal hit chance by 15 and the critical damage by 50 %.

As soon as a medium or high level commander is in an army the unit stats are unbalanced. The commander should use active abilites to improve the accuracy by 25 for 1 turn, the spell resistance by 25 for 1 turn, ...

The cooldown of player and monster abilities should be reduced to 3 turns to make the combat more interesting.

The scaling of some spells destroys the balance. For example flame dart is useless at low levels and overpowered at high levels.

The power of some spells is too low (shadowbolt, cloak of thorns, ...) and should be increased like the healing spells in 0.87

The AI does not use strategic spells (pillar of flame, freeze, ...) against the player and strategic spells inflict too much damage IF a high level mage casts them.

city militia units will only fight once: attack with one sacrificial unit, then attack with a second stack and all the city defenders won't be there

City Razing is imbalanced. Should NOT be instant razing. A raze should take duration equal to city level.

Diplomacy is still an aspect of the game that is lacking. There are not enough options to interact with the AI. Different types of treaties. Different types of pacts and alliances. AI should have different levels of tolerance in dealing with you

Just to throw in my 2c, I agree that these are 3 of the more pressing issues. There's probably others, but just reading through what has been posted so far... these would be some areas i'd like to see some attention.

Bows and staves have no special abilities. Bows should have the rain of arrows ability and staves should have the focus ability that works like the spell with an additional action.

Staves should use spell mastery for the attack and spell resistance for the defense.

I like these thoughts.

I would offer that 'rain of arrows' be limited in range (assuming that you mean for the ability to do splash damage to a 2x2 tile area) so that bowmen cannot abuse it from afar.

Staves definately need some kind of ability like 'surge' or 'Spell Focus' that increases the potency of your next spell by 25%. (ie, casting Blind with surge would generate a 31% blindness instead of the regular 25%)

All 'magical' staves should be ranged weapons that deal magical damage equal to their specific shard type (blunt weapons staves that have no magical properties can remain melee, though I doubt any hero would use them). This would place mages on the backline WHERE THEY BELONG. Mage path should have the ability to increase the damage of their staff weapon embeded within. Something like "Attunement - increase staff attack by 25% if you share magic type as the staff)

Here I am again. Thanks for all your ideas and tops that should be on our community TODOlist. I formatted my original post and added all suggestions into it. If anything doubled or tripled I added the infamous to it.

I hope that we will get more into here as time passes by.

I will continue to update the OP.

Please feel free to suggest different categories or a more fitting order.

The path trees are too long and the abilities have too many prerequisites. For example instead of evoker I - IV there should be only aeromancy, geomancy, ... that increases the damage of air, earth, ... spells by 50 % or instead of vital strike I - III there should be only vital strike that increases the critiacal hit chance by 15 and the critical damage by 50 %..

Totally agree here. After playing a few games in beta, I think when a champion levels up, they should be able to choose one upgrade in each tree. I find myself choosing only spells in the beginning. By the time I start choosing combat skills the game is nearly over.

The Commander Champions should be able to gain XP 's while assisting cities too.

Quoting Wizard1200, reply 4 The path trees are too long and the abilities have too many prerequisites. For example instead of evoker I - IV there should be only aeromancy, geomancy, ... that increases the damage of air, earth, ... spells by 50 % or instead of vital strike I - III there should be only vital strike that increases the critiacal hit chance by 15 and the critical damage by 50 %..

Totally agree here. After playing a few games in beta, I think when a champion levels up, they should be able to choose one upgrade in each tree. I find myself choosing only spells in the beginning. By the time I start choosing combat skills the game is nearly over.

The Commander Champions should be able to gain XP 's while assisting cities too.

I suggested two perk picks per level, with the only restriction being you couldn't pick two perks on the same tree (i.e. 2 deep picks) in another thread recently. This way, more of the traits trees will come into play. I don't really have a problem if they are from the same profession (i.e. both on General tree or Both on 'Assassin/Summoner/etc. tree), or one from each tree. Flexibility is good.

-Break skill does not work. It graphically applies the debuff on targeted enemy, it is shown when inspecting said enemy in tactical screen, but it's effect is not applied, target retains full defense (against all attackers, including the Assassin who used Break).

This needs to be fixed because is one of the reasons an Assassin sovereign or champion would work, since all undead and many boss / champion type of creatures are immune to critical hits (which negates a whole line of specialization). Being able to remove one enemy defense (has a 5 turn cooldown) is what makes them viable past mid-game. This is most especially vital to Kingdom players who don't have easy access to Death spells to remove the defense of enemies.

Also another execution glitch with Rain of Arrows from Assassin path, sometimes (often) instead of firing instantly the caster remains stuck for 10-15 seconds with no casting animation then the damage happens instantly.

And finally archery bug. If my Assassin uses bows, and I researched end of the line longbows (including magical ones) who supposedly ignore 50% of target defense, that coupled with my 75% target defense ignore from Assassin path, should give me 100% Defense ignore on enemies. Yet the damage displayed on tooltip and actual damage dealt in combat reflects that neither are applied at all. With a Sovereign with 24 attack, with a bow that deals fire damage and amulets that add fire and ice damage (2 each), with 75% + 50% Defense ignore, with Break used, should do more than 1-5 damage on a Statue Lord (or what he's called, the ones leading the golem bands in scrapyard).

This is a serious detriment / handicap to ever making currently Assassin's be it melee or ranged ones. If you are forced to pick / learn spells and specialize in those because your attacks deal pathetic damage, that's a problem Houston!

Caster heroes, even those with "melee" weapons equipped like the starting caster staff should be treated as ranged units for troop placement at the start of a battle. Caster heroes are still starting in the front lines with the melee troops if they have a staff/dagger.

AI is terrible at building infrastructure. Villages, Conclaves and Towns all build troops even when fortresses are available. Ive seen newly founded villages produce troops then build buildings that increase food or gildar by %.

Few Late game Mage/Archer items and much less Mage items compared to melee. More quests should give options to choose between different artifacts.

[tacks can't move after fighting: let an enemy clear a nest of baddies, then claim the treasure yourself. With some clever use of sacrificial units and choke points, you can keep enemy stacks at bay indefinitely. (Brainjuggler)

- Fight ends movement is ok for stacks without hero, but hero stack should continue fighting, current champion system can manage this. (sharpxe)

- Combat ending the stack's turn should be REMOVED. Instead, new rule should be implemented 'each unit can only be part of one combat'. You should be allowed to MOVE after combat. (GFireflyE)]

Stacks of death are already too strong as is. High movement speed is also very strong. The current system rewards spreading out and using multiple units. The AI should take further advantage of the system, rather than going back to the previous system.

[The cooldown of player and monster abilities should be reduced to 3 turns to make the combat more interesting. (Wizard1200)]

[Bows and staves have no special abilities. Bows should have the rain of arrows ability and staves should have the focus ability that works like the spell with an additional action. (Wizard1200, GFireflyE)]

[Staves definately need some kind of ability like 'surge' or 'Spell Focus' that increases the potency of your next spell by 25%. (ie, casting Blind with surge would generate a 31% blindness instead of the regular 25%) (GFireflyE)]

Complex does not equal interesting. Vanilla pieces are as important as their more complicated counterparts.

[Totally agree here. After playing a few games in beta, I think when a champion levels up, they should be able to choose one upgrade in each tree. I find myself choosing only spells in the beginning. By the time I start choosing combat skills the game is nearly over. (Lord Micheal)]

The current system helps keep each hero distinct. It's fine as is.

[As soon as a medium or high level commander is in an army the unit stats are unbalanced. The commander should use active abilites e.g. to improve the accuracy by 25 for 1 turn, the spell resistance by 25 for 1 turn, ... (Wizard1200)]

If commanders are too strong, then their abilities should be weakened, but making them be like other heroes just so that they line up better is wrong. The entire point of a commander is to fill the role of a vanilla hero who doesn't have to go about doing stuff to function. We already have an active buffer, he's the defender.

[Outposts require a different unit for construction. At the moment, it costs WAY too much for pioneers to be used to construct outposts. The SCOUT unit should have the option to be consumed and build an outpost. Imo, upgrading outposts should involve scouts being consumed on the site to select an upgrade INSTEAD of the current option of building upgrades directly from your city. Outposts should also have the CHOICE of which city they are to be associated with and thereby where the bonuses they are collecting are going to. Resources should be tied to the closest outpost/city. (Not just the closest city). (GFireflyE)]

Outposts are already powerful. Cities of death sounds like a bad idea.

[unique buildings must be reworked in favor of MP balance - first player who build recieve fullpower structure, all other players still able to build it, but recieve only minor bonus. (sharpxe) [Stardock said that the game will not be balanced towards MP if there will ever be one.]]

What makes unique buildings cool is their uniqueness

Okay, now I'd like to lodge my biggest complaint against the game's current form-

It's too easy to do absurd stuff in combat. Summon Skeletal Horde+Cull the Weak and Gallowman's consume spirit can generate far too much mana, Beastmasters can tame extremely powerful beasts, en-masse early in, which then have no upkeep. Life Draining abilities and free heals makes the fastest way to recover health, to find a random weak AI city or wandering monster as a full heal. I propose that abilities that produce mana in combat should be capped at the amount of mana you started the battle with. Same for health production abilities. Tame beast's cost should scale to the level of the enemy monster, making it easier to tame wandering wolves in the beginning, and harder to start out with an armada of cave bears.

I would just note that I don't think Flame Dart ever becomes overpowered, considering the 3 turn cooldown. It becomes useful at high levels, yes, but how often do you bother levelling an evoker to get to that point?

I've actually changed mine to do more damage than default, and I'm quite happy with how it plays.

Summon Skeletal Horde, on the other hand, is one of the best spells in the game (even if you don't drain them for mana) as enemies seem to prioritize killing them over more important targets. It's certainly far more useful than Summon Lightbringer and makes the boss fights a cakewalk (though staff mages do that even better.)

I would just note that I don't think Flame Dart ever becomes overpowered, considering the 3 turn cooldown. It becomes useful at high levels, yes, but how often do you bother levelling an evoker to get to that point?

I've actually changed mine to do more damage than default, and I'm quite happy with how it plays.

Summon Skeletal Horde, on the other hand, is one of the best spells in the game (even if you don't drain them for mana) as enemies seem to prioritize killing them over more important targets. It's certainly far more useful than Summon Lightbringer and makes the boss fights a cakewalk (though staff mages do that even better.)

Thing is, the purpose of skeletal horde is to both provide meatshields for the summoner, as well as to limit movement for enemy troops. This is vital when playing Resoln faction since they are limited to Leather armor. Dodge is RNG, no matter how high you can get it (I never got past 40% dodge on troops, and that starting with the base 20% from racial), is not a good or encouraging defense when battling mid-late game enemies.

You can't simply compare one summon to another based on position in skill tree and say this is more useful or better than this or that. There are situations where you need a special ability from a summon which your spells (or lack of) can't provide. For example Ice Elemental attack still slows Immune to magic enemies, while no spell cast by you will have any effect on them. Skeleton horde is mainly a meatshield since they have very low initiative and attack (not to mention accuracy). When you fight a dragon it doesn't matter if you summon one or 9, they have abilities that deal AoE damage (be it breath, or cleave attack etc). Any mid game and higher enemy is capable of 1 shotting skeletons, sure if you fight a single enemy with no aoe (like an obsidian golem) he'll spend time beating the skellies to a pulp while you shoot him or w/e.

[The cooldown of player and monster abilities should be reduced to 3 turns to make the combat more interesting. (Wizard1200)]

[Bows and staves have no special abilities. Bows should have the rain of arrows ability and staves should have the focus ability that works like the spell with an additional action. (Wizard1200, GFireflyE)]

[Staves definately need some kind of ability like 'surge' or 'Spell Focus' that increases the potency of your next spell by 25%. (ie, casting Blind with surge would generate a 31% blindness instead of the regular 25%) (GFireflyE)]

Complex does not equal interesting. Vanilla pieces are as important as their more complicated counterparts.

I think that the swarm mechanic, the impale ability, the cleave ability, the crushing blow ability and the power shot ability made the tactical combat more interesting, because the player has more options.

I would just note that I don't think Flame Dart ever becomes overpowered, considering the 3 turn cooldown. It becomes useful at high levels, yes, but how often do you bother levelling an evoker to get to that point?

You can level very fast, if you take air 2 and the brilliant ability at the beginning, cast tutelage on your sovereign and select the knowledge ability. A single fire dart inflicts 71 points of damage (30 (level 15) + 4 (2 shards) + 25 % (warlock or item) + 80 % (evoker IV)) and kills most heroes with ONE hit.

Thank you all for your feedback. I did add part of it into the OP, but I feel that if the list gets discussed inside itself it would be too much, so I didn'T add any counterarguments into it. I feel that if the Devs needc any they do know them themselves.

Anyways I added a few more of the other (new) points.

Please feel free to +1 any notion currently on the board. It will help shift the focus to it. Even though it is much to read please do take the time and then post what you support the most. Maybe 3-5 points?

Guys, while logically the city raze should take longer, why should I take the unrest penalty of an additional number of cities? It just drags the game down.

While it's currently not the actual case in the game, you shouldn't be receiving a global unrest penalty for having a recently conquered city to your empire. That unrest should be localized to the conquered city in question. As the local unrest of the conquered city decreases over time, the global unrest should increase.

Quite a good idea. Logically when you conquer a city that city should not like that (+50% Unrest as it is), but the other cities in your Empire which were neither conquered or part of your empire for so long there is no penalty anymore should actually like that "their empire expands".

I've thought every version of WoM/FE/LH was released at least a month too soon (perhaps a year too soon in the case of WoM!). Stardock just don't seem to want the same level of quality that I (and apparently many in the community) want, which is strange given they appear to be pretty much unconstrained by money since the sale of Impulse.

I agree with many of the bugs above. In particular I think releasing with the current population/pioneer mechanics would be a huge fail - the population system is so easy to abuse and the benefits so large that only a fool would ever have a city not growing at maximum rate (even if that means 10 queued pioneers and a total stored population that is more than the population max for the city).

Many other serious issues too but I just can't believe Stardock are considering releasing with the population problem.

BTW: The hard cap of 9 on resources per square of land (ie grain + materials + essence <= 9) is my personal bugbear, I detest this change. Not sure if others agree but merely knowing that I have no chance of finding a really awesome settle spot removes a significant part of my fun from exploring and expanding. I haven't tried the latest couple of versions tho so it is possible they have already removed the hard cap.